WATCH: Gael Monfils complaints to captain Bjorn Borg and other teammates after a heated moment with Felix Auger-Aliassime during the Laver Cup 2023
It was a series of exchanges of words between Gael Monfils and Felix Auger-Aliassime during the match taking the contest to another level.
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Gael Monfils and Felix Auger-Aliassime shake hands after the match. (credits: RFI, Twitter)
The first day of the most coveted Laver Cup has ended with Team World having the better of the European boys, but it was during the matchup between Gael Monfils and Felix Auger-Aliassime that attracted the viewers the most. To utter shock, it wasn’t the impressive tennis that made the headlines rather, it was a series of exchanges of words between the two parties that took the contest to another level.
After the start of the match, Gael Monfils was going slow and easy, taking long breaks between points, and it angered Felix a lot. Felix complained to the match umpire about this pleading for a time violation and said, “I can play games too.” This didn’t go down well with Monfils as he started taking several digs at young Felix on numerous occasions with the crowd playing its part, raising the tensions even more.
Monfils said, “I have a kid… If I don’t want to play a tournament, I don’t play a tournament. They called me and said you can be free. For me, I’m here to have fun.” Felix replied to this saying to Ben Shelton during the bench time, “What have the people that brought him here told him?” But later all the fire was blown off as the two stars shook hands with Felix, having the last laugh, winning the match eventually by a scoreline of 6-4 and 6-3.
How did the first day of the 2023 Laver Cup go?
With the stakes too high for this year’s Laver Cup, the first day was a walk in the park for the boys in red. Team World won all four matches on Day 1 leaving the European boys with a lot of catching up to do when they start the second day. With most of Europe’s finest not available this year, Bjorn Borg had put his trust in experienced and veteran stars such as Gael Monfils, Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, and Arthur Fils.
The first match saw Arthur Fils go up against one of America’s new rising stars who has shone immensely this year coming back from a semi-final finish at the US Open, Ben Shelton didn’t sweat at all beating the Frenchman comfortably by 7-6, 6-1. Next up was Fokina against Francisco Cerundolo and the Argentinian held his nerves quite well, winning the match by 6-3, 7-5. After that Felix beat Monfils and in the last doubles encounter Andrey Rublev and Fils suffered a 6-3, 4-6, 10-6 defeat to the duo of Frances Tiafoe and Tommy Paul.
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Soumyadeep Mondal
(882 Articles Published)